MacKay Receives Lindquist Award

OGDEN, Utah – Associate professor Kathryn L. MacKay recently was named the first recipient of the John A. Lindquist Award.

MacKay, who has taught in the Department of History at Weber State University since 1988, received the award based on her work in mentoring students in learning through community involvement.

MacKay has been influential in promoting learning through civic engagement at WSU and throughout the state. She has been involved, since its inception, with Utah Campus Compact, an organization dedicated to promoting service learning on Utah’s college campuses. She also used part of her salary to help establish the Office of Academic Service Learning at the university in 2000.

In several of MacKay’s courses, students are required to do service learning, including working at the TreeHouse Museum, Fort Buenaventura and local museums and archives, as well as after-school and tutoring programs in Weber and Davis counties. She also helped establish the American Democracy Project at WSU, which encourages campuses to provide students with civic engagement experiences.

MacKay plans on continuing her work with service learning in the future. “Hopefully, I will continue to learn how to better foster in my students a sense that the individual can contribute to the common good,” she said.

A committee with representation from faculty, staff, trustees, community partners and students selected MacKay. She will be formally honored at a special awards ceremony on April 6 at the Lindquist Alumni Center.

The award is named for John A. Lindquist, a strong advocate for education and the community, who has spent a lifetime supporting Ogden, Weber County and Weber State. John’s daughter Kathryn Lindquist was instrumental in establishing the new award.

Lindquist’s ties to WSU date back to the late 1930s, when he attended Weber College and was a student body officer. Through the years, he has generously supported cultural, academic, athletic and student activities and programs at Weber State.